Читать книгу COLORADO SPECTERS - Lisa Yorio - Страница 7

Denver, Colorado

10/2010

Apparition of a sickly boy / Ghost cat / Banging & crashing sounds have been heard / Doors open & close by themselves / Walls vibrate / Red rubber ball has been seen bouncing down the stairs / Glass doors have blown up / Bedroom doors shake / Piano plays by itself / Deafening noises from the chimney / Items fly around the house / Walls exploded during a demolition of the house / Red ball has been found where the house once stood

Haunted History

The Henry Treat Rogers Mansion was built in 1892 at 1739 East 93th Avenue at the north edge of Cheeseman Park. It was a big, white house with a federal design built for an influential railroad attorney. Henry was the founder of the University and Denver clubs. He served as a park commissioner and was a major figure in the Unitarian Church.

After he passed away, the structure went to his niece, Francis Ristine. After she passed away, her husband relocated. Other occupants came and went. It had been vacant for about 18 months, before Russell Hunter rented it in early 1968. He was a Broadway and Hollywood composer.

Hunter thought the Cheeseman Park mansion was an ideal place to settle in and write his music. He was plagued by mysterious events in the house. Hunter consequently moved out after living in the house for about a year.

Hunter told his story of paranormal events that occurred in the house to a Hollywood colleague in 1976, who wrote it and sold it to a Canadian studio. The film was called "The Changeling" and released in 1979. It was a Canadian horror film directed by Peter Medak. It starred George C. Scott and Trish Van Devere (Scott's real-life wife).

The story is based upon events that writer Russell Hunter said he experienced while he was living in the Henry Treat Rogers Mansion in Denver, Colorado.

The plot of the film is about Dr. John Russell (George C. Scott), who is a composer living in New York City, who moves cross-country to Washington state following the deaths of his wife and daughter in a traffic accident in New York.

Russell rents a large, old, and elegant Victorian era mansion and begins piecing his life back together.

He discovers the ghost of a murdered child. The spirit shatters windows, opens and shuts doors, and manifests itself during a seance. He finds out that the child is Joseph Carmichael. He was murdered by his father. Joseph was a crippled, sickly child, and in the event of his death, the family fortune would pass to his mother's side of the family. Joseph's father drowned the young Joseph in the bathtub, secretly replaced him with a healthy orphan, and took him to Europe in the guise of seeking a treatment or cure. He returned several years later with an imposter, now grown and "cured' of his illness, and continued as if nothing had happened. But now the ghost of the real Joseph was haunting the house to get Dr. Russell to investigate the murder, and bring forth justice. A stellar cast and low-key suspense have made this film a classic.

Paranormal Phenomenon

A little more than a week after Hunter moved in, strange things began to happen. A ghostly cat appeared one day in April 1968. Banging and crashing sounds were heard regularly, coming from the direction of a bedroom fireplace. He yelled "stop it" and never heard the noise again. Next, doors mysteriously began to open and close unaided, while walls vibrated and threw paintings to the floor.

Most of all, he was disturbed by a continual banging sound which appeared to be coming from the attic.

A woman he met at a bridge game told Hunter that a poltergeist was in the house. An architect, exploring the house with him, discovered a sealed off stairway behind a second story closet that led up to a small attic compartment. When they opened the door, a red rubber ball came bouncing down the stairs and disappeared.

Hunter called over seventeen friends and showed them the secret passage to the attic. Once again, when he opened the door, a red rubber ball bounced down the steps and vanished.

In the attic, Hunter discovered a child's trunk that contained a diary of a nine year old boy whose family had hidden him in the attic because they were ashamed that he was born a cripple. The journal mentioned the boy's favorite toy was a red rubber ball.

A three night seance was held at the Cherry Hills mansion of parapsychologist Robert Bradley. Many details of the crime were exposed. A medium told Hunter that the crippled child would have inherited a large fortune from his grandfather, but the child died before he could inherit it. He was buried secretly, and the family adopted a similar looking boy from an orphanage and played him off as their own in order to collect the inheritance.

The spirit of the crippled boy would not rest. The medium said his body had been buried in South Denver, at a spot that was now under a closet sill of a bedroom in a designated house. The medium said that there would be a gold medal inscribed with his birthday buried with his remains under the floor. Permission was granted for exacerbation under the bedroom floor, and the gold medal was found.

Disturbances at the Henry Treat Rogers Mansion continued. As Hunter approached some glass doors, they blew up and shards of glass cut an artery. Some bedroom doors shook.

Efforts were made to exorcise the house, including sprinkling it with Jordan River holy water. The bouncing noise ceased but then the piano started playing by itself. Around 6 am, the docks would start endlessly chiming. Deafening noises came from the chimney. Items flew around the house where it was no longer safe to live in.

A few months later, the Rogers Mansion was demolished to make way for an apartment complex. During the work, walls of a bedroom exploded and crushed a man operating the bulldozer said Hunter.

After the demolition, the ghost still remained there for a while. Sometimes a sickly youth is seen on the northern fringe of the park.

A strange red rubber ball has been found across the alley from where the Rogers Mansion stood.

Late at night, residents of the new apartment complex have witnessed a red, rubber bouncing down a stairwell. Unexplained piano music has been heard in the building.

Hunter moved into a house on Kearney Street, but the poltergeist moved with him and the disturbances continued. Hunter has seen a skeleton of a boy, complete with gold medallion, identifying himself as Eric, the son of a callous millionaire. Hunter called in a priest from Denver's Epiphany Episcopal Church to perform the rites of exorcism at the house. It apparently worked. The priest heard no more from Hunter after the incident.

Unusual events happened at the corner of 13^th avenue and Williams street immediately after the distribution of the Rogers House.

The residents in the area were complaining about the massive clouds of dust continually blowing through the neighborhood which stemmed from the sandblasting of a high rise at the corner. People passing by have reported seeing strange items near the intersection.

Members of the descendants of the families of the families that demolished the Rogers house were cursed by bad luck as their heirs came to untimely ends.

My Investigation

When I was doing some research on this house, I discovered that the house was based on the horror movie "The Changeling." I knew this house was close to Cheeseman Park but I wasn't sure exactly where.

It was hard to find because the house was demolished and only a vacant lot remains where the house once stood.

When I drove past the location, it was very dark and the only thing I could see was old, decrepit looking cornstalks to the right side of the property. I started taking pictures and got a pattern of small orbs emerging from the cornstalks. When I got out of the car and started walking around I felt cold and the place seemed creepy. There is another house next to the cornfield. It looks like a small and old apartment complex. I felt very uncomfortable, so I took pictures very quickly and then returned to the car and drove away.